An Assortment of Oneshots
by Uninsane
Summary: This will be made up of oneshots were small changes are made to cannon.


**Disclaimer: **This work is in no way associated with J K Rowling. All recognisable characters and places belong to J K Rowling. This was written purely for my enjoyment, I am making no money from this story. No infringement is intended.

**A/N:** This story will include quotes from TGoF chapter 22 - 23, all quotes will be bold.

* * *

**"Potter! Weasley! Will you pay attention?"**

**Professor McGonagall's irritated voice cracked like a whip through the Transfiguration class on Thursday, and Harry and Ron both jumped and looked up.**

**It was the end of the lesson; they had finished their work; the guinea fowl they had been changing into guinea pigs had been shut away in a large cage on Professor McGonagall's desk; they had copied down their homework from the blackboard. The bell was due to ring at any moment, and Harry and Ron, who had been having a sword fight with a couple of Fred and George's fake wands at the back of the class, looked up **with trepidation**.**

**"Now that Potter and Weasley have been kind enough to act their age," said Professor McGonagall, with an angry look at the pair of them, "I have something to say to you all.**

**"The Yule Ball is approaching - a traditional part of the Triwizard Tournament and an opportunity for us to socialize with our foreign guests. Now, the ball will be open only to fourth years and above - although you may invite a younger student if you wish -"**

**Lavender Brown let out a shrill giggle. **Harry turned to stare at her in horror, giggly girls were not one of his favorite things after all. **Parvati Patil nudged her hard in the ribs, her face working furiously as she too fought not to giggle. They both looked around at Harry, **and started to giggle again. **Professor McGonagall ignored them, which Harry thought was distinctly unfair, as she had just told off him and Ron. **

**"Dress robes will be worn," Professor McGonagall continued, "and the ball will start at eight o'clock on Christmas Day, finishing at midnight in the Great Hall. Now then -"**

Harry raised his hand, a knot of dread growing in his stomach.

"Yes, Potter," Professor McGonagall said with and an air of resignation.

"Uh - Is the ball - Mandatory," Harry said

"Yes Potter," Professor McGonagall said in exasperation, "you are a school champion and you and your partner will be opening the ball."

Harry's head slammed into the desk and Professor McGonagall continued with her announcement.

**"The Yule Ball is of course a chance for us all to - er - let our hair down," **Harry just drown the rest out and tried his best to ignore the inane giggling.

* * *

**"Why do they have to move in packs?" Harry asked Ron as a dozen or so girls walked past them, sniggering and staring at Harry. "How're you supposed to get one on their own to ask them?"**

**"Lasso one?" Ron suggested. "Got any idea who you're going to try?"**

**Harry didn't answer. **He had thought he had known who he wanted to ask, but a few minutes of observing Cho had yielded two facts. She was the queen of giggly girls and she had a boyfriend, Cedric Diggory, the other Hogwarts Champion.

**Ron seemed to **think he knew **what was going on inside Harry's head.**

**"Listen, you're not going to have any trouble. You're a champion. You've just beaten a Hungarian Horntail. I bet they'll be queuing up to go with you." **Harry was unwilling to dignify that with a response.

**In tribute to their recently repaired friendship, Ron had kept the bitterness in his voice to a bare minimum. Moreover, to Harry's amazement, **and chagrin, **he turned out to be quite right.**

**A curly-haired third-year Hufflepuff girl to whom Harry had never spoken in his life asked him to go to the ball with her the very next day. Harry was so taken aback he said no before he'd even stopped to consider the matter. The following day, two more girls asked him, a second year and (to his horror) a fifth year who looked as though she might knock him out if he refused.**

**Hermione's words about Krum kept coming back to him. "They only like him because he's famous!" Harry doubted very much if any of the girls who had asked to be his partner so far would have wanted to go to the ball with him if he hadn't been a school champion.**

* * *

As the Christmas holidays approached **some of the teachers, like little Professor Flitwick, gave up trying to teach them much when their minds were so clearly elsewhere; he allowed them to play games**, as long as the game made some use of charms, **in his lesson on Wednesday, and spent most of it talking to Harry about the perfect Summoning Charm Harry had used during the first task of the Triwizard Tournament. Other teachers were not so generous**, most notably Professor Snape.

**"Evil, he is," Ron said bitterly that night in the Gryffindor common room. "Springing a test on us on the last day. Ruining the last bit of term with a whole load of studying."**

**"Mmm . . . you're not exactly straining yourself, though, are you?" said Hermione, looking at him over the top of her Potions notes. Ron was busy building a card castle out of his Exploding Snap pack - a much more interesting pastime than with Muggle cards, because of the chance that the whole thing would blow up at any second.**

**"It's Christmas, Hermione," said **Ron **lazily.**

**Hermione looked severely **at him and then turned to Harry. **"I'd have thought you'd be doing something constructive, Harry, even if you don't want to learn your antidotes!"**

**"Like what?" Harry said**, feeling a little smug about getting to pull one over on Hermione.

**"That egg!" Hermione hissed.**

"But Hermione," Harry smirked, lifting up the language textbook he was reading from, "I am working on the egg." Then he sighed and said in despair, "Not that its helping any, I haven't found anything."

Hermione looked completely flabbergasted at the fact that Harry was studying and Ron was so shocked that he caused his whole tower to fall down and then explode in his face.

Hermione whispered, "Do you need any help Harry?"

Harry sighed and noded, "I will get you a list of the book I have already gone through."

* * *

**"We should get a move on, you know . . . ask someone. He's right. We don't want to end up with a pair of trolls." **Ron said to Harry while the three of them were sitting in the common room.

**Hermione let out a sputter of indignation.**

**"A pair of... what, excuse me?"**

**"Well - you know," said Ron, shrugging. "I'd rather go alone than with - with Eloise Midgen, say."**

**"Her acne's loads better lately - and she's really nice!"**

**"Her nose is off-center," said Ron.**

"**Oh I see," Hermione said, bristling. "So basically, you're going to take the best-looking girl who'll have you, even if she's completely horrible?" **Harry started at that, that sounded like an awful idea - giggly girls, enough said.

**"Er - yeah, that sounds about right," said Ron.** Harry turned to stare at him in absolute astonishment, that Hermione noticed but Ron didn't.

**"I'm going to bed," Hermione snapped, and she swept off toward the girls' staircase without another word.**

* * *

Harry was just about to smack Ron upside the head for laughing at Neville when **Hermione climbed in through the portrait hole.**

**"Why weren't you two at dinner?" she said, coming over to join them.**

**"Because - oh shut up laughing, **Ron **- because **Ron just got turned down by Fleur Delacour when he asked her to the **ball!" said Ginny.**

**That shut Ron up.**

**"Thanks a bunch, Ginny," said Ron sourly.**

**"All the good-looking ones taken, Ron?" said Hermione loftily. "Eloise Midgen starting to look quite pretty now, is she? Well, I'm sure you'll find someone somewhere who'll have you."**

**But Ron was staring at Hermione as though suddenly seeing her in a whole new light.**

**"Hermione, Neville's right - you are a girl. . . ."**

**"Oh well spotted," she said acidly.**

**"Well - you can come with one of us!" **Harry immediately distanced himself from Ron and looked at Hermione, pleading for her to understand that he wasn't a part of this.

**"No, I **won't go with you Ron,**" snapped Hermione**, and when she flashed Harry a smile, the boy let out a massive sigh of relief, but then his newly rediscovered mental powers started to work -

**"Oh come on," he said impatiently, "we need partners, we're going to look really stupid if we haven't got any, everyone else has . . ."**

**"I **won't **come with you," said Hermione, **more firmly this time, "you shouldn't have asked me as a last resort Ron Weasley." Then she turned and left the common room.

"There all mental," Ron said in a loud voice, but Harry ignored him and set out after Hermione, a plan already forming in his mind.

As the portrait closed Harry conjured a bouquet of flower with the conjuration Ollivander had used at the wand weighing ceremony, pulled out the map, put on his invisibility cloak, Moody's constant vigilance had been making more and more sense to him recently, and set off after Hermione's footprints.

He caught up to outside the library but altered his plan slightly and followed her in.

Harry could hear Hermione muttering something about, "Idiot - last resort - arguing." When he pulled of the cloak with a flourish, he had been practicing, and sat down beside her.

Hermione smacked Harry upside the head and whispered, "Why did you do that, you scared me half to death."

Harry smiled and move the flowers out from behind his back and handed them to Hermione, who gasped in surprise and her eyes suddenly looked suspiciously long

"Hermione, I would first like to tell you exactly how stupid I feel for taking this long to realise - how I fell," Harry was suddenly feeling painfully nervous while Hermione looked almost exultant.

"Would - would you like to - that is." Hermione reached out and took the flowers and that gave Harry the courage to say, "Hermione will you be my girlfriend."

Hermione fell backwards out of her chair and Harry just managed to grab her hand before she fell to the ground.

"You want me - y-you -" Hermione stuttered and Harry cast the flower conjuration spell a second time and said, in a much more confident tone said, "Hermione will you go to the Yule ball with me."

Before he could blink, Hermione had tackled him to the flour in one of the most epic hugs of all time.

When the two of the had gotten to there feet, Harry smirked and said, "I will take that as a yet." He then had to report to the hospital wing because of blood force trauma from one of Hermiones books.

* * *

**Snow was falling thickly upon the castle and its grounds now. The pale blue Beauxbatons carriage looked like a large, chilly, frosted pumpkin next to the iced gingerbread house that was Hagrid's cabin, while the Durmstrang ship's portholes were glazed with ice, the rigging white with frost. The house-elves down in the kitchen were outdoing themselves with a series of rich, warming stews and savory puddings, and only Fleur Delacour seemed to be able to find anything to complain about.**

**"It is too 'eavy, all zis 'Ogwarts food," they heard her saying grumpily as they left the Great Hall behind her one evening (Ron skulking behind Harry, keen not to be spotted by Fleur). "I will not fit into my dress robes!"**

**"Oooh there's a tragedy," Hermione snapped as Fleur went out into the entrance hall. "She really thinks a lot of herself, that one, doesn't she?" **Harry nodded in agreement with Hermione. Fleur may look nice but she whined so much. Hermione was also his girlfriend, but he made sure not to tell her that was part of the reason he agreed with her.

**"Hermione** - why don't you go to the ball with me?**" said Ron.**

"Because I am already going with someone," And as Ron started to open his mouth she said, "and no I wont tell you who it is, you will just make fun of me and make trouble for my date."

"Come on Hermione, who are you going to the ball with," Ron whined, Harry and Hermione had agreed not to tell Ron about their relationship for obvious reasons.

**"You're joking, Weasley!" said Malfoy, behind them. "You're not telling me someone's asked that to the ball? Not the long-molared Mudblood?"**

**Harry and Ron both whipped around** Harry already going for his wand**, but Hermione said loudly, waving to somebody over Malfoys shoulder, "Hello, Professor Moody!"**

**Malfoy went pale and jumped backward, looking wildly around for Moody, but he was still up at the staff table, finishing his stew. **Harry noted this and decided he had to find out how to do that spell, Malfoy looked absolutely terrified.

**"Twitchy little ferret, aren't you, Malfoy?" said Hermione scathingly, and she, Harry, and Ron went up the marble staircase laughing heartily.**

**"Hermione," said Ron, looking sideways at her, suddenly frowning, "your teeth ..."**

**"What about them?" she said.**

**"Well, they're different. . . I've just noticed. . . ."**

**"Of course they are - did you expect me to keep those fangs Malfoy gave me?"**

**"No, I mean, they're different to how they were before he put that hex on you. . . . They're all... straight and - and normal-sized."**

**Hermione suddenly smiled very mischievously, **Harry had already noticed her new teeth, he had commented on it after only half an hour **: It was a very different smile from the one he **had **remembered.**

**"Well. . . when I went up to Madam Pomfrey to get them shrunk, she held up a mirror and told me to stop her when they were back to how they normally were," she said. "And I just. . . let her carry on a bit." She smiled even more widely. "Mum and Dad won't be too pleased. I've been trying to persuade them to let me shrink them for ages, but they wanted me to carry on with my braces. You know, they're dentists, they just don't think teeth and magic should - look! Pigwidgeons back!"**

It took Ron a bit of work but he managed to get the letter to Harry and they set off to find a place to read it.

* * *

After a wonderful Christmas morning **they went out onto the grounds in the afternoon; the snow was untouched except for the deep channels made by the Durmstrang and Beauxbatons students on their way up to the castle. Hermione chose to watch Harry and the Weasleys' snowball fight rather than join in, and at five o'clock said she was going back upstairs to get ready for the ball.**

**"What, you need three hours?" said Ron, looking at her incredulously and paying for his lapse in concentration when a large snowball, thrown by George, hit him hard on the side of the head. "Who're you going with?" he yelled after Hermione, but she just waved and disappeared up the stone steps into the castle. **Harry could only smile.

* * *

**Harry, Ron, Seamus, Dean, and Neville changed into their dress robes up in their dormitory, all of them looking very self-conscious, but none as much as Ron, who surveyed himself in the long mirror in the corner with an appalled look on his face. There was just no getting around the fact that his robes looked more like a dress than anything else. In a desperate attempt to make them look more manly, he used a Severing Charm on the ruff and cuffs. It worked fairly well; at least he was now lace-free, although he hadn't done a very neat job, and the edges still looked depressingly frayed as the boys set off downstairs.**

**"I still can't work out how you got **one of **the best-looking girl in the year," Dean muttered to Ron.**

**"Animal magnetism," said Ron gloomily, pulling stray threads out of his cuffs.**

Parvati was waiting for Ron down in the common room, somehow he had been able to find time to find a date even while obsessing about who Hermione was going with. **She didn't look too enthusiastic about having Ron as a partner, though; her dark eyes lingered on the frayed neck and sleeves of his dress robes as she looked him up and down. **Harry felt a little bad for her.

Just as they reached the center of the Great Hall Ron turned to with a confused expression Harry and said, "Who is your partner?"

Harry just smiled and pulled out his wand before crying, "Accio My Yule ball date," and Hermione, looking almost unrecognisable in her beautiful blue robes and her hair was tied up in an elegant knot at the back.

Laughter rang out when people connected the 'fake' spell work to the first task. I turned and saw that Ron was staring at me in open mouthed shock and that Parvati was staring at Hermione with such malice that I couldn't believe Hermione hadn't caught on fire.

**Then Professor McGonagall's voice called, "Champions over here, please!"**

The four of us and our dates walked over to where the Professor was standing.

**Professor McGonagall, who was wearing dress robes of red tartan and had arranged a rather ugly wreath of thistles around the brim other hat, told them to wait on one side of the doors while everyone else went inside; they were to enter the Great Hall in procession when the rest of the students had sat down. Fleur Delacour and Roger Davies stationed themselves nearest the doors; Davies looked so stunned by his good fortune in having Fleur for a partner that he could hardly take his eyes off her. Cedric and Cho were close to Harry too** though they had eyes only for each other. Krum was glaring at Harry and had brought a girl to the ball that Harry didn't know.

The other students started to pass us on the way in to the hall, but none of them seemed to realise who Hermione was.

**"Hi, Ron!" she said,** as the two of them passed. **"Hi, Parvati!"**

That was apparently enough for them to realise who it was that was on Harry's arm. **Parvati was gazing at Hermione in unflattering disbelief. Ron walked right past Hermione without looking at her**, but then cast a glance back when the couple wasn't watching**. **Even **Pansy Parkinson gaped at her as she walked by with Malfoy, and even he didn't seem to be able to find an insult to throw at her. **

**Once everyone else was settled in the Hall, Professor McGonagall told the champions and their partners to get in line in pairs and to follow her. They did so, and everyone in the Great Hall applauded as they entered and started walking up toward a large round table at the top of the Hall, where the judges were sitting.**

**The walls of the Hall had all been covered in sparkling silver frost, with hundreds of garlands of mistletoe and ivy crossing the starry black ceiling. The House tables had vanished; instead, there were about a hundred smaller, lantern-lit ones, each seating about a dozen people.**

Harry **caught sight of Ron and **Parvati **as he neared the top table. Ron was watching Hermione pass with narrowed eyes. **Parvati **was looking sulky. **

They quietly sat down next to Percy Weasley, who explained that he had been made Mr. Crouch's personal assistant and that he was here.

They were able to discern the trick of ordering food from watching Dumbledore and soon the whole Hall was eating the magnificent feast.

**When all the food had been consumed, Dumbledore stood up and asked the students to do the same. Then, with a wave of his wand, all the tables zoomed back along the walls leaving the floor clear, and then he conjured a raised platform into existence along the right wall. A set of drums, several guitars, a lute, a cello, and some bagpipes were set upon it.**

**The "Weird Sisters now trooped up onto the stage to wildly enthusiastic applause; they were all extremely hairy and dressed in black robes that had been artfully ripped and torn. They picked up their instruments, and Harry, **getting that feeling of nervousness again stood with Hermione and the two of them walked out onto the dance floor with the other champions.

The four couples took up their starting positions and then began to slow dance around the room as the Weird Sisters began to play, Harry had been practicing for only a short while but between his determination fueled steps and Heroines long practiced grace, Her parents had her dancing at a young age, the first dance was braved but the second dance, when other couples began to join them on the dance floor and they were no longer the center of attention, was better. Harry and Hermione slowly moved across the dance floor, staring into each others eyes. They didn't see the glare from Ron, they didn't see the envious look from Parvati and they ignored the repeated attempts to cut in to their dance.

Time passed slowly for the couple, they dance song after song moving closer and closer. Harry began to lean in to Hermione and Hermione closed her eyes -

"What are you doing," Ron shouted, jumping up from the table he had been sitting at the whole night and ran over and tried to pull Hermione away.

Harry pivoted Hermione so that he was between them and noticed that Hermione had drawn her wand and was pointing it at Ron.

"What do you mean, what am I doing, I was trying to kiss my girlfriend, so if you don't mind, I would like to get back to that." Harry said in a cold voice.

"You need to have everything don't you Potter," Ron spat, "fame, glory, money and my girl - urk"

Ron was silenced as Hermione hit him with a slug vomiting charm. Harry shouted, "Protego!" and the slugs splattered against the shield.

"I - Am - Not - Your - Girlfriend!" Hermione shouted, punctuating each word with a stinging hex, "You have no claim over me and if you even insinuate that Harry is any less than the humble hero he is, I will personally make your life a living hell."

"Potter fifty points from Gryffindor and a weeks detention," Shouted the well known voice of Professor Snape, "your arrogance knows no bounds, attacking a student in the middle of a -"

"How can this be Dumbly-dorr," Madam Maxime shouted from the crowd, "the boy has done nothing wrong." (**A/N: **If anyone wants to PM me this or any other speech that needs an accent I will edit it in, but I am not going to try, because It will be awful)

"Yes, Severus," The grandfatherly voice of Headmaster Dumbledore broke through the commotion, "It was an obvious mistake on Harry's part but I don't believe detention will be necessary."

Murmurs of shock and outrage began to spread out into the crowd. Harry, seeing Madam Maxine prepare to speak again politely cuts her off by saying, "Madam is it possible for me and a few of my friends to transfer to your school?"

Then enraged whispers cut of immediately, as everyone who heard the question stares at Harry in open mouthed shock. While Dumbledore turned to Harry with a twinkle in his eye and said, "My boy, I am sure that you don't mean that?"

Harry ignores the man and motions for the Headmistress to speak.

Madam Maxime said is a thoughtful voice, "Yes I believe we could enroll you for next year," She casts a sly look at Dumbledore, "seeing as you are no longer enrolled in Hogwarts, you will have to know French of course."

"What do you mean he isn't a Hogwarts student -" Dumbledore starts speaking, his twinkle gone and a sick feeling was beginning to twist up in his stomach.

Harry interrupts Dumbledore by saying, "Je peux parler français, Hermione m'a appris. (I can speak French, Hermione has been teaching me.) Are there any other requirements?"

"You will receive a book and supplies list the same as you would get at any magical school, I will get you a book on etiquette for you to read Mister Potter." Madam Maxime said, she was now smirking at Dumbledore.

"Is it possible for me to stay at Beauxbatons over the summer," Harry said after a slight pause, "my current guardians are less than satisfactory."

"Harry you must stay at your Aunt's for your protection," Dumbledore said, dismay plain on his face, "the wards -"

"Don't protect me from my family." Harry shouted, his eyes blazing, "Voldemort is less of a threat to my life then those three muggles." There was a gasp, this wasn't how they had been told the boy-who-lived was raised…

Harry quickly pulled the cloak over both of them and activated the portkey that he had made to deposit them by the lake.

This was the night of the ball and he was going to get that kiss.


End file.
